High-speed Line Servicing of Medium-sized Intermediate Cities: a Case Study of Jihlava (Czechia)

Abstract

The paper focuses on the issue of high-speed rail line (HSL) in Czechia, a country where no such line has ever been built. In particular, attention is paid to the way in which medium-sized intermediate cities are connected to future HSL in Czechia. Within the HSL between Prague and Brno, this problem concerns Jihlava, where two ways of servicing the Jihlava region are considered in the feasibility study currently being carried out. The article focuses primarily on the direct connection of Jihlava to the HSL and the author looks at this connection in terms of the possibilities of using current and design conventional infrastructure. Consequently, the suitability of the different parts of the infrastructure for the operational concept under consideration is calculated using the multi-critical decision-making method. At the end of the article, it was found that in the case of a decision on the direct interconnection of Jihlava and the HSL, it is necessary to build a new conventional infrastructure also in Jihlava, since without this the fulfilment of the operational concept of line is difficult to reach.